Dad asked me this morning if I'd be his chainman for a job he had to do today. My Dad is a surveyor, and I haven't seen him in action since I was a kid.
Technology has certainly made the profession evolve. Previously, being a chainman involved being on the other end of a chain - in this case a long, thin length of metal with specific lengths marked on it (a throwback to the Imperial measurement system of links and chains and whatnot) measuring various distances from pegs and nails in kerbs to correctly mark out the boundaries of properties.
Today, it involved holding a small prism in various places, while Dad used his theodolite, complete with laser distance measuring equipment, and plotted various points and bearings and distances in his data recorder, where he'll later upload them to his computer and draft a plan.
I still have no real appreciation for what doing a survey entails, but it was interesting to see what he has to do from an adult's perspective, rather than a child's. The equipment sure is expensive. Each prism is $300 a throw.